The Cessna 120-140 Association Forum

Can anyone help me find a horizontal stabilizer?!
Mine is corroded inside, the underside beat up, and one rib slightly smashed.

I see it listed on Univair for $9900! Yikes. Nothing on The Controller, Ebay items look in bad condition.

Thank you anyone who has, knows of, or has suggestions on finding!!

I would recommend calling all the salvage yards. Also Williams Airmotive in Kendallville Indiana, they mostly specialize in wings and wing repair, but used to have many other "flight controls", they can also reskin your unit. Or contact David Lowe, he may have a spare one laying around.

I'm moving this to the Aviation Marketplace in hopes you get better responses.

John, Victor, Fellow Members

Thank you Victor for the suggestions. It's my first time removing rivets but I'm nearly there. Soon I will see what the actual corrosion damage is and rib damage while considering repair of rib and replacement of all of the skins.

Thank you John as well. I am a new member and a new 140 owner - although this is an airplane my dad owned when I was a kid that I have re-purchased after it sat in pieces for 30 years. At any rate, I really appreciate both you guys helping out and anyone else lending advice on purchasing or re-building my stab. I will now investigate the "marketplace". I didn't realize it existed within this 120/140 association!

Wish me luck as I work diligently to bring 2212N back into service!

Thanks for the lead Victor,

I found out that Williams Airmotive is now Airframe Components.

Nathan at the control surface division tells me they are too busy to take on new projects, unfortunately.

I like the idea of re-skinning. Thanks anyone else who knows possibilities to get my H Stab rebuilt.

You might try Tim Mix. I think he's done it before...

You might try locating a local A&P school and see if they can reskin it for a class project.
I have heard of some schools doing things like that.
Worth a phone call or two.

Rick

Thanks for the suggestions members and I appreciate even more input. It sounds like I need to call Tim Mix and get to know him. I like the A&P school idea. I've been striking out at salvage yards though I don't have a comprehensive list; only Google.

Rebuilding the H Stab is a strange predicament to me. Although I have no experience with aviation rivets I have a lot of experience with mechanical projects that exceed the quality of "professionals". Even in the aviation industry I see a ton of short cuts and good enough mods and repairs that wouldn't suit myself.

The frustration is that the A&P I'm working with acts like this work must be done by a certified shop. I'm new to this and don't understand the signing off and dos and don'ts of structural rebuilding. I feel like the costs to send this thing away and have a rib replaced and re-skinned will push it into the $6000 range for work that can be done right here in the hangar. $9800 Univair part seems unrealistic given the value of the airplane.

Thanks again folks for suggestions on finding a suitable replacement or repairing mine.